So far, Pixar movies never disappointed me. From earliest Toy Story to the recent Wall. E, Pixar always keeps the energy flow. The audience gets sucked into the story and feels the characters' happiness, sorrow, pain, and joy.
The latest movie, UP, brings really high expectation. Not only because of the Asian boy, but also the Pixar's reputation. To be honest, I didn't think that Wall. E was gonna be really good from the trailer at all, but Pixar again surprised me with the story, and how the last computer on earth is a Mac (XD). This time, I watched UP with the "surprise me again, Pixar!!!" thought. The result: Pixar did not fail me, again. Although it does have parts that I don't like as much, but over all it is an awesome movie.
Let's break it into several parts:
The background is about this old
man, Carl Fredricksen, chasing his and his wife's dream to build a house on the top of Paradise Fall, which is somewhere in South America. Carl, through some incidents, is stuck with Russell, a boy from boyscout who is trying to get his final badge (helping elder badge) to be an experienced boyscout.
The first part of the story is about how Carl becomes who he is and how those two meet each other. Also, they start travelling together to Paradise Fall. (This part is relatively short, and it's a bit chunky in my opinion)
Then the second part is about how they meet the legendary bird: Kevin and a talking dog: Dug. Dug can talk because of the collar he has which is made by his master.
The third part shows how they meet Dug's master, the former famous explorer Muntz and how they are trying to save Kevin from Muntz. Of course Oixar movies always have happy endings, and this one is not an exception.
As I mentioned earlier, the first part of the story is a bit chunky. They got (close) to the Paradise Fall really fast and I was like WTF for a while. At that time, I didn't know what else to expect since they got to the place already. Just when I was thinking that, new characters, Kevin and Dug appear and bring in another part of the story. That's where the story actually starts rising. For a moment the house already lands at the top of the Fall, but when Carl tries to save Kevin (and Russell), he actually fly the house again to catch up with Muntz's airship. Part of it is because he sees his wife, Ellie's last words for him: have a new one (adventure). At almost the end of the movie, a lot of the balloons got shot by Muntz and the house drops into the clouds and finally disappears. (they are on the airship above the clouds.) Carl actually gets sad because he thinks that he cannot fulfill the promise with Ellie, but when the story ends we actually see the house landing exactly where it is supposed to be. it might be kind of cliche, but it's still cute. :)
Although it is a little hasty at first, I do think Pixar did another good job.
Pixar movies always have decent musics, but here I have to mention just one of those that really caught me. The Carmon it plays at first really fits into the story for some odd reason and it gives a slight funny touch to start the story with laughter. I do not why it fits in so well but it is done very nicely.
I give this part 5/5. Every character is so unique that you can just describe one thing about them and other people can guess who it is. Another good touch about the characters is those talking dogs. In the movie, all dogs can talk because of the collars. Also, the dogs can pretty much do everything from cooking to piloting a fighter jet. Groups such as the staff of Ice Age have similar ideas. In Ice Age III, they make the dinosaurs flying in a formation just like our aircraft, and they use fruits to be the cannons. The difference here is that Ice Age uses creatures as machines, and UP uses creatures to use machine. In a sense it's more of a personification, but I'll leave the judgement to you guys.
here I'm going to describe the main characters and how they grow in the story.
Carl:
Carl is somewhat a complicated person. He has the promise and the dream to build a house at the top of Paradise Fall, but to the others he's just a mean, lonely old man. Carl has the heart to change but the reality does not give him the chance until the day Russell shows up and the incident of injuring the working man.
Carl became who he is at the beginning of the story because of his wife, Ellie. They met each other when they were young. Both of them have the dream of going to Paradise Fall and build a house there (actually it was more of Ellie's dream but Carl picked it up as they grew up). After Ellie's death, Carl lost the energy of doing everything until he saw their "Adventure Book" again and decides to leave the place along with the house. Little did he know that this trip becomes his life's turning point.
Throughout the story, Carl acts as a mean-outside-but-warm-inside character. Although he always says things like "that's non of my business" or "I don't care", he actually helps Russell to save Kevin. With a warm heart, he cannot let Kevin be captured so easily (or else there would be no story :p).
The movie starts with how he and Ellie met and how they both have the same idol: the explorer Muntz, who was doubted bringing back fake fossils from South America. They grow up together and get married. The movie shows that even after they got married they still have their dream. As one day when Carl bought the tickets to South America as a present to Ellie, Ellie was already too weak to travel and had to be hospitalized. When Ellie dies, Carl lost the energy. Again, not until the incident of injuring the worker can Carl again start thinking about travelling. Carl worked at the zoo as a balloon seller. There are several times when the cart that hold the balloons start floating, giving the idea of having enough balloons to make the house float.That's what Carl did. With the passion he found again, he travels to South America to build his and Ellie's dream house.
When he meets his idol, Muntz, he's really happy. Of course, who wouldn't be right? But soon enough he finds out that the reason Muntz is here is because he wants to capture the giant bird that he once brought the fossil back. Muntz believes that only the living birds can prove that he's right. Because Carl already formed friendship with Kevin (although he refuses to believe that), Carl decides to help Kevin to escape.
The staff doesn't really show much about the transaction of Carl's heart. It'd be because it's too deep for kids to understand. instead they show how bad Muntz is to create the ultimate villain in this story.
I do like to see a little more about Carl's inner side. That can make the story even deeper. (don't blame me, I'm not a kid after all :p)
Russell:
Russell appears as a boyscout (or what they called, wilderness explorer) who's trying to help some elder to get his last badge to become an experienced explorer, and he ends up at Carl's house. At first Carl is just trying to get rid of him by telling to chase a bird that does not exist. However, when Carl launched his house with balloons, Russell somehow shows up at the front door.Without any option, Carl has to take him in and travel with him.
Russell's character is a kid who seeks father's love by working hard in the boyscout so he can receive the badge from his dad. He is also the kid that provides pureness and naiveness in this story. When he brings Kevin to Carl, he says the typical kid's line: Can we keep him. He does the same when they meet Dug.
Russell and Carl form the odd friendship through the trip, along with a lot of funny side story. For example, there's one scene when Carl thinks of dropping Russell down to one of the skyscrapers by a rope, but the rope breaks and Russell falls down. Carl then says: that's not gonna work. Another part when Russell tells Carl that he has a GPS that can lead then to Paradise Fall but soon drops it out of the window. Many little things make the audience know the two characters more. Russell is also the link between Carl and two other animals. Without Russell, the second part of the story would not be there and the entire movie would be lame.
At the very end, Russell's dad still does not show up. Instead, Carl gives Russell the badge that proves his ability and courage. That badge is not the helping elderly badge, however. Russell receives the Ellie badge that shows up at the beginning of the movie, and it is the symbol of being part of Carl and Ellie's family.
Interesting fact: Russell is the first Asian character in Pixar movie.
Ellie:
It might be funny how I think this character is the most well developed. Although she only shows up for the first 20 minutes of the movie, her importance can be greater than Russell's. To me, Ellie links the past, present, and the future of Carl's life. The past is shown in the movie. The present is how Ellie still affects Carl when he does everything. And the future is how Ellie tells Carl to move on.
The best part, to me, is when Carl is going through their adventure book. At the beginning of the movie, the adventure book only has several pages about how Ellie want to build a house at the top of Paradise Fall and some documentaries about that place. Leaving with the page that says: stuff I'm going to do, Carl never passes that page to see the rest of the book until the house actually lands on top and Kevin gets captured.
Going through the rest of the Adventure book, Carl sees all the photos about the happy time he spent with Ellie ever since they got married. At the end of the book, Ellie left the comment that says: Thank you for the adventure, now have your own one. Carl then makes up his mind to save Kevin (and Russell who tried to save Kevin but is captured). To him, that's his new adventure, and this might not happen without Ellie's last words.
As I mentioned earlier, Carl's inner side is not really shown in the story, but Ellie makes up that part by providing some physical evidence that Carl was once, and can again be, passionate and adventurous. The movie ends with a climax of saving Kevin and dueling Muntz.
She's probably my most favorite character in the entire movie.
Muntz:
The story actually starts with Muntz being called a lier by bringing back a giant bird's fossil. this poor guy then disappeared saying that he'll capture a real one to prove that he's right. He was both Carl's an Ellie's idol in the past, and also the reason for them having the dream of building a house at the top of Paradise Fall.
We do not see Muntz again until later when Carl an Russell got captured by Muntz's dogs. At first Muntz was really welcoming, but he changed soon after finding out that Kevin is the bird that he seeks. Although it doesn't really show it in the movie, apparently he killed a lot of people who found him. The movie only shows all those people's helmets and goggles. i don't know if he's a bad guy or just a poor guy who is misunderstood. The greed of capturing Kevin makes him go against Carl and Co., and ultimately makes him the villain.
At the end of movie, he drops off the airship and disappears from our view. I don't know if this is the first time Pixar kills a villain but to me it's kinda disturbing just because it's supposed to be a kid's movie.
Kevin & Dug:
Kevin is the plot for the second part of the story. Although it has a male name, Russell soon learns that it's actually a female bird. Although it is the main reason of the second part, it doesn't really paly a significant role in te story.
Dug is the dog who originally works for Muntz but turns to Carl. he doesn't have a significant role either but does have some funny plots involving him.
I watched the 3D version and it's not that 3D. The title and credits are 3D but the rest is.....well 3D but not 3D enough. I guess this technique is still developing so I shouldn't ask for too much, but yea it's a little disappointing.
If we just talk about the clearness and animation, I think it's awesome. Well, it's Pixar after all. if Pixar doesn't have good animation, then the world should come to an end (lol~).
I think that's it for now. I don't think I'll come back again to talk about this movie but who knows maybe I will :)
